ROGUE: 20 Hades
Title Definition HADES – n., the underground abode of the dead in Greek mythology; Pluto, Sheol, Hell. Synopsis Literally everyone in the surface except Sakimura, Ichise and Doc are ghosts. Ghosts that talk back, but ghosts all the same. Even Doc says that she is dead herself, murmuring in her hotel room, when Ichise says he is going back to Lux. He goes back to the train station. Sakimura tries to talk to a boss about the impending invasion, but the boss gives him a routine brush-off. But when Sakimura returns to his desk, his computer goes haywire. Sensors note trouble from the underground. Ichise meets up with Sakimura on the way to the train station. In the process of walking Ichise meets his father’s ghost. He makes peace with it, telling his father that he did not understand the whole situation before and is sorry for the things he said and thought about him. Soon afterward the ghost disappears. Doc is never seen again in the hotel room. Instead, we hear her voice over the old radio. She talks about her ideals regarding Texhnolyze, and essentially, how her ideals were all shattered. She says she was interested in Ichise because she saw his eyes. There was the will to live in it, and in his kind, the ones who were forced to live in Lux. She wanted to know Texhnolyze’s full potential in Ichise. Now she would never know. (Note the water spilling under a door. It can be surmised that Doc has drowned herself in the bathtub.) As expected, a train arrives at full speed into the surface from Lux. But the tunnel leading directly to the surface is closed off. Also, the stairs leading from Lux is bombed. Both tactics successfully prevent Kano’s army from getting into the surface, save for four Shapes, one of them Toyama. Toyama tells Ichise that neither of them can go back to Lux because the entry points were closed off. Futhermore, Ran has been captured by Kano for his purposes. Toyama kills off the Shapes that came with him, then challenges Ichise to a duel. Ichise ends up winning over Toyama by beheading him. Toyama thanks him as a brother, before his head separates from the rest of his body. After the fight, an elderly man with mechanical orthotics (supports, not replacements) on his legs talks to Ichise. This is Saginuma. He tells him that Ichise and his kind were separated to the underground, so that Teonormals (people with the orthotics) could be developed and could evolve into the next level of human being. Unfortunately that did not happen. However, Ichise could expect nothing by going back to the underground. Thus, he is being asked to stay. Ichise just leaves the man alone. Sakimura tells Ichise that the air vent leading into Lux was spared. He helps Ichise down into the air vent. He too turns into a ghost. Special Notes This episode was not part of the original Fuji TV release, but was first made available over the internet. Therefore this is one of the “secret episodes”. When Texhnolyze was aired over Animax, it was included with the rest in its proper place. Gallery Category:Episodes Category:Secret Episodes